Garden Earth Naturalist Investigating and restoring planet Earth Acknowledgements
Garden Earth Naturalist Investigating and restoring planet Earth Note to Parents and Youth Leaders ii
C o nt e nt s : What is an Ecosystem?................. 1 Air Cleaning Department Food Department Pest and Disease Control Department Pollination Department Soil Department Water Purification Department Warehouse Department iii
Welcome to Garden Earth! What is a naturalist? Naturalists are neat people who know lots of important things about earth and like to help make earth a better place. Calling all Naturalists on Garden Earth! You live in and are a part of Garden Earth. Garden Earth is an amazing place with more than 950,000 species of insects 270,000 species of plants 19,000 species of fish 10,500 species of reptiles and amphibians 9,000 species of birds 4,000 species of mammals. WOW! Now is your chance to explore your own backyard while learning about places around the world! Along the way there will be many opportunities for you and your family to take care of Garden Earth. The following pages are for you and your families to complete together. Sign up to be a Garden Earth Naturalist! Yes! I want to investigate and help Name(s) Age(s) Address
garden earth naturalist Name: It s time to investigate Garden Earth! Do you know that every place on earth including your backyard and your school site as well as a beautiful forest is an ecosystem that supports life? What is an Ecosystem? THE BIG QUESTION: What eco-services are provided by my ecosystem? Write the Spanish translation every time you see a blank after a word. Welcome to Garden Earth! North America English Spanish Garden Earth Ecosystem North America South America Soil Water Air Tierra del jardín Ecosistema Norteamérica Suramérica Suelo Agua Aire E and South America (in Spanish) cosystems around the world provide important life support services. A dry forest in Mexico, a hardwood forest in Georgia, as well as the ecosystem on your school site and in your own backyard provides pollination services, healthy soils, clean air, clean water, pest control and much more. Read on to discover how the Garden Earth supports your life! The State Botanical Garden of Georgia, UGA in partnership with Trees are GREAT!
The Place that Flora Plant Built As you read the story, draw Flora Plant s Place. Each bold word in the story will indicate something you need to add to your picture. Flora Plant wanted to have her very own Place in the world. She liked being by herself. But she was smart enough to know that she needed some important things if she was to grow. So, into her Place, Flora Plant brought some sun, air, and water (small raincloud). She also needed minerals. Oops! she said. Where will I get them? I think I need some soil! She needed soil, too, for her roots to stretch and grow. (Draw a line across the picture to separate the air and ground. Put extra soil around Flora s roots.) Now, Flora s Place had sun, air, water, minerals, and soil. Flora began to grow. Oops! she said. I m too hot. I m drying out! Flora Plant needed shade. So, to her Place, she added a shade tree. Now Flora s Place had sun, air, water, minerals, soil, and a shade tree. One day, a pretty pink flower poked out of her leaves. Oops, she said after awhile. Something is wrong! My flower is producing pollen. But I have to get pollen from other flowers. I need more flowers just like me. And I need some pollen carriers. So Flora added some more things to her Place. Now Flora s Place had sun, air, water, minerals, soil, a shade tree, and more flowers like her. She also added some bees to carry pollen. Oops! Flora s problems were growing. The bees had a large family and they needed a place to live. They needed many, many flowers. Some of these flowers wanted shade trees too. So Flora got to work until her Place had sun, air, water, minerals, soil, lots of flowers, more shade trees, and a hollow stump for a bee house. Flora s flowers were fading, leaving sticky brown seeds. Oops! said Flora. How am I to get the sticky seeds from my stems to some good soil? She needed a furry carrier. So, to the sun, air, water, minerals, soil, shade trees, flowers, bees, and hollow stump, she added a fox. The fox needed a tree-root den in a thicket with lots of plants. It needed rabbits and mice to eat and a stream for water. So, Flora s Place soon had not only sun, air, water, minerals, soil, shade trees, flowers, bees, stumps, and a fox, but a fox den, rabbits and mice, and a stream. STOP! Is your picture getting too crowded? Indeed, Flora s place is becoming a forest HABITAT for many plants and animals. And more will be needed. The fox will need a family. The rabbits and mice will need food and houses and water. The shade trees and plants will need fungi and insects and worms to make good soil. Birds are moving into the shade trees. What will they need? Did you notice that to meet her needs, Flora has not only built a habitat but put together an ECOSYSTEM? Remember that an ECOSYSTEM is the life-supporting web that develops among the living and non-living parts (like air and sun) of an environment. In a natural ecosystem, the parts work together to provide the services each member needs for ongoing life. Plants turn the energy of the sun into food energy for themselves and the animals that eat them. Water, oxygen, carbon dioxide, and minerals are used and recycled. Each plant and animal is part of its habitat and plays a role in providing these ECO-SERVICES. Each member (including us) of an ecosystem depends on these ecoservices to survive.